


Time Of Your Life

by saddle_tramp



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe, Episode Related, M/M, Wincest - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-26
Updated: 2011-02-26
Packaged: 2017-10-15 23:15:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/165874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saddle_tramp/pseuds/saddle_tramp
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rating: PG-13</p><p>Summary: Many moons ago, when a semi hit a '67 Impala and made me cry, I wrote a fic to fix it in my head so Dean lying dead in the back seat of his baby would stop intruding on my dreams.</p><p>This is that fic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Time Of Your Life

_Another turning point, a fork stuck in the road, Time grabs you by the wrist, directs you where to go, So make the best of this test, and don't ask why; It's not a question, but a lesson learned in time._

_It's something unpredictable, but in the end it's right. I hope you had the time of your life._

' _Time of Your Life_ ' by Green Day

 

~*~*~

 

When Dean opened his eyes, he felt like someone had run over him with a tank.

The first thing he saw was the blurry ceiling of what _had_ to be a hospital room. He hated how familiar the ugly lighting and the track for the privacy curtain were, but being in a hospital was good this time. He hurt so much that he knew he was lucky he had made it that far.

He laid there trying to gather his wits for a long time, breathing gingerly because of the throbbing ache in his chest. He slowly realized that his right forearm was heavy with plaster against his side, the fingers too swollen to flex very far. His chest was bandaged tightly and every breath hurt in a way that he knew from painful experience meant several broken ribs. He tried to shift and groaned at the sudden pain in his right leg, which he realized was encased in heavy wraps up to mid-thigh and suspended a few inches above the bed.

He was still for a moment, trying to remember when he hurt his arm or his leg, and then gingerly turned his aching head to look around. "Sam?" he whispered hoarsely, and then licked his dry, cracked lips slowly. He felt like he hadn't had a drink in days, which could be true for all he knew.

"Sammy?" he tried again, managing a little more volume. It was an effort to speak above a whisper, but he needed to know where Sam was and that he was okay.

Dean had no idea how he got to the hospital, but he _knew_ that Sam should have been there when he woke up. The last thing he remembered was being in the car with Sam after the demon had almost ripped Dean's heart out. Dean had already been hurt badly when he passed out, and going by the cast on his arm and the way his leg felt, something major had happened after that.

Dean gathered his strength for a moment and then shoved himself up into a sitting position with his good arm. The effort made him cough, which hurt like a son of a bitch. He fought not to pass out for several minutes, gasping for breath as his head throbbed in time with his pounding heart. Judging by the pain in his left shoulder when he moved, 'good arm' was a very relative term. The arm wasn't actually broken, but the shoulder felt like it had been dislocated. Again.

Eventually the pain receded enough for him to think and he looked around the room. It was a private room, just like any of a dozen cheap backwater hospitals he'd been in over the years, but it looked like no one had been there except him. There was a chair in the corner by the A/C unit, a small table by the bed, the medical equipment hooked up to him, and that was it. There was no sign anyone else had been there, no jacket, no book, nothing.

Dean was beginning to get scared. The simple effort of _breathing_ hurt like hell just then, so Sam should have been right there trying to pretend he wasn't about to bawl like a girl because Dean almost got himself killed. He hurt worse than he ever had before, so he was _sure_ Sam was worrying himself half to death. Sam was the type that worried and hovered over him when Dean just needed a few stitches, and it wasn't very likely that a nurse had run Sam out. Sam's puppy-dog eyes worked on nurses the way Dean's flirting worked on waitresses, though Dean had never figured out why Sam didn't use the sweet sensitive act to get laid, too. He was sure girls would be all over that.

So yeah, Sam should have been there. 

…Unless something had happened to him, and Dean didn't like that idea at all. The demon could have attacked them, or possessed Dad again and ran them off the road, or _anything_ , and Dean wouldn't even know it. He was out fucking cold, bleeding all over leather seats that he just _knew_ were never going to come clean again. The world could have ended after he passed out and Dean probably wouldn't have known it until he was already getting his introduction to Lucifer. After all the things Dean had done - and the worse things he had wanted to do - he was sure he'd have a front row seat in Hell.

Dean stared at the open door for a long time just breathing carefully and willing Sammy to walk through it, _needing_ Sam to walk in, but his brother's familiar goofy face did not appear. He finally licked his lips and swallowed, then gathered himself and closed his eyes. "Sammy!?" he bellowed with most of his usual volume, and then his arm suddenly gave out and he fell back onto the bed. He gasped in pain when his injuries were jarred and then coughed, which hurt even more and set off more spasms of pain in his chest. He felt like someone had gouged his heart out with a spoon, which was much too close to the truth for comfort even though the damned demon did it with its _mind_ , not a spoon.

Dean let out a choked little laugh at that random thought and gasped out, "There _is_ no spoon." He had watched that movie with Sam more times than he cared to count, snarking at the plot while Sam tried to convince him Neo was cool. No matter how hard Sam argued, Dean would never admit that he liked Neo. He had too much fun provoking Sam by saying Neo was a wuss.

"Here now, stop that! You're going to do yourself serious harm!" an older woman exclaimed, hurrying into the room. She was wearing colorful scrubs and looked frightened. "Be _still_!"

Dean turned his head enough to look at her, ignoring the phantom spots he could see floating around. "Where's Sammy?"

The woman frowned, reaching out to put her hand on his forehead. "Be quiet, you shouldn't try to talk. You're in the hospital."

"No shit, lady," Dean growled, gritting his teeth. "Last thing I remember, I was in the car with Sammy. _Where is he?_ "

"Oh, child-"

The pained look on the woman's face was all it took to make Dean panic, and the surge of fear made him forget the pain for a moment. He started to shove himself up in the bed again, wild-eyed. "What happened? Is he okay?"

The nurse reached out to push very lightly at his shoulder, half afraid to touch him, but even that little push was enough to make Dean gasp and fall back. "Hush and be still, before I sedate you!"

Dean glared all of his anger, frustration, and fear at her, gritting his teeth again as he ground out, " _Where. Is. Sam?_ "

The nurse jerked her hand away as if it had been burned. "I- I don't know," she said shakily, staring. The sheriff had warned the staff that the young man might be dangerous, but she hadn't believed that such a sweet-faced boy could hurt someone. After seeing that look in the boy's eyes when he asked about this 'Sam', her opinion changed in a heartbeat. He looked very capable of murder just then, and she actually considered calling security before her rational mind caught up. She was suddenly glad that the boy couldn't even sit up, much less do anything more. "You were alone when you were found."

"Where?" Dean asked, jaw still clenched. He knew he was scaring the woman, but he couldn't make himself care. Finding out what happened to Sam was much more important than whether or not he freaked out someone's granny.

The nurse swallowed hard and then said quietly, "There was an accident, a collision with a semi. You-" She swallowed again at the look in Dean's eyes, stepping back slightly. "Are you sure someone named Sam was with you? You've got a mild concussion. Maybe you're mistaken. You were alone in the car when the paramedics arrived."

Dean stared at the nurse a moment longer and then blinked and looked at the ceiling, trying to remember. Concussion explained the blurry vision, the throbbing head, and the random spots he was seeing when he moved around too much. A wreck would account for the other injuries. The way he had been slumped in the back of the car, he would have been thrown around like a BB in a boxcar.

The last thing he remembered was Dad telling Sam that nothing was more important than killing the demon. He closed his eyes suddenly, feeling guilty because it was only then that he remembered Dad. Dean had been sitting right behind him, last he remembered, listening to Dad rant while Sam drove.

Sam had let the demon escape to save John's ungrateful hide, mostly, Dean was sure, because Dean begged him to. Dean couldn't bear the thought of Sam having to kill Dad and had used every bit of strength he had just then to stop that from happening. Sam would have done as Dad ordered if Dean hadn't been there, but Dean knew that the guilt would have eaten Sam alive before long. He couldn't let Sam do that, no matter what. Losing Dad to the demon would have been awful, but losing him and breaking Sam's spirit at the same time would have killed them both. Dean had been forced to learn how to live without Dad, but he couldn't live without Sam, not anymore.

Once the demon fled, John was just as angry at the boys - particularly Sam - for fucking up the job of killing it as Dean had expected him to be. Dad had made it very plain he thought both boys were fools instead of the trained hunters he raised them to be. He scolded Sam like he was ten years old again, and for the first time in years Sam had taken the abuse without protest.

Dean remembered looking into Sam's eyes in the rearview mirror while Dad rambled on, the way Sam had tried to smile at him, and then everything went black.

"You were very lucky to survive," the nurse said quietly, distracting Dean from his thoughts. "The sheriff said the car was totaled. You have a concussion, a broken arm and leg, several broken ribs, and quite a few lesser injuries."

Dean remained still and silent for a moment, gathering his wits again before he asked huskily, "And no one wondered why I was in the _back_ seat."

The nurse blinked and then said slowly, "I- I don't know. There was a tractor-trailer that didn't stop at an intersection. The other driver was thrown from his truck in the accident. He didn't make it."

Dean glanced at her, breathing a bit raggedly, then stared up at the ceiling. If the body was outside the vehicles, it might not have been the driver of the semi, no matter what the cops thought. He closed his eyes, trying not to dwell on the possibility Sam had died at the side of the road. Whenever Dean got hurt, Sam had a habit of forgetting about everything else. It had gotten them into trouble more than once. He could easily picture Sam absorbed in driving as fast as possible, so worried about getting Dean to a doctor that he ignored approaching vehicles at an intersection.

"Did he have ID?" Dean finally asked, dreading the answer.

"Yes," the nurse said, confused. "The sheriff said his name was Logan."

Dean shuddered and clenched his jaw again, his good hand fisting the blanket. Dad used the name John Logan, and had probably had that ID in the car. It was one of the safe ones he usually kept on him, just in case. That didn't explain why they thought he was driving the truck, though, or who had hit them, or even why Sam had disappeared.

The young man's reaction puzzled the nurse. "Did you know him? Sheriff Greene has been ripping out his hair because no one can find any record of Logan except for a car registration, and you didn't have any ID at all." She didn't mention that the sheriff had told her that the car Dean was found in was registered to a dead murderer. The young man was enough on edge that she wasn't sure she wanted to go down that road with him just yet, especially not while she was alone.

"I did," Dean said quietly, his voice ragged. "John wasn't in the truck that hit us, though. He was in the front seat, with Sam."

"You were alone in the car when the sheriff arrived," the nurse repeated, frowning slightly. "He was very specific about that."

"I don't know how I could have been," Dean ground out, jaw clenching again as he turned his head to glare at her. "Last I remember, Sammy and I were with John, in the car. He was-" He broke off and swallowed hard, trying to get rid of the sudden lump in his throat. He couldn't let himself think about Dad being dead after they went through so much to keep him alive. If he did, he'd break into a thousand little pieces, and Sam wasn't there to help put him back together again.

"Sammy was driving when I fell asleep," Dean went on after a moment. "We've been on the road together a long time. He couldn't stand to stay around Lawrence anymore - that's where we're from, Lawrence, Kansas - and I went along to keep him out of trouble. We picked John up yesterday. His truck was stolen and he needed a ride, and we were in the area so we swung by to take him to his cousin's place."

That ought to explain the Impala's registration, and Dad's pickup if it was ever found since it was registered to John Logan. The Impala was still in Dean's name, but he was supposed to be dead so it wasn't too unusual for his brother to have the car.

It was also a story Sam and Dean had used several times, and one Sam knew to fall back on when they got separated with no cover planned. Dean even had a clean ID in the car that would back that up. Of course, he also had ID in the car saying he was a priest, a paramedic, an FBI agent, and a dozen other things, so he hoped Sam had gotten at least the laptop case out when he had to go. Explaining away the weapons in the car would be hard if the local sheriff wanted to make trouble, but one look at the IDs and journal that they kept with Sam's laptop would put them in jail and make any judge throw away the key.

"I'll call the sheriff and let him know there was at least one more person who might have been involved in the accident. Your friend could have been disoriented and wandered off trying to find help. You were pretty far out of town, he could still be wandering in the woods."

Dean knew that Sam wouldn't have just _wandered away_ while he was unconscious and possibly dying. If Sam wasn't right there with him when the ambulance arrived, then there was some reason Sam _had_ to leave. That idea scared the fuck out of Dean, and he hoped that it had at least been Sam's idea to go. He didn't want to think about what the driver of the truck could have done to Sam while he was out cold after an accident. The demon could easily have caused the accident to get to Sam, and Dean was in no shape to set up a rescue mission.

Dean never considered the possibility that Sam was dead. He could not lose Sam _and_ Dad in a car accident after getting them both away from that goddamned demon alive. He refused for that to be possible.

He couldn't tell the nurse any of that, though, couldn't even afford to think about it very much or he'd shatter. He made a conscious effort to distract himself with details, trying to piece together more of what happened. "Why did the sheriff think John was driving the truck?"

"There was no one else in the area except you and him. It was a natural assumption, I would think." She paused and then asked a bit hesitantly, "And you say there were two more people involved?" The young man's story didn't make much sense, but that could be the head injury. He obviously knew the man Logan because she hadn't told him that the dead man's first name was John, but nothing else could be certain. He might be remembering a drive from days before the accident he was hurt in, even weeks or months.

"Sammy was driving when I fell asleep," Dean repeated doggedly. "I don't know a damned thing about the truck. There could have been a dozen people in it for all I know, I never saw it."

"Was this Sam person related to you?" the nurse asked, frowning.

Dean felt like someone was choking him when she referred to Sam in the past tense, as if he were dead. "No, but I've known him all his life." It hurt to deny that Sam was all he had left, but if he said he was Sam's brother it would raise all kinds of questions Dean couldn't answer without going to jail for murder. "And there should have been ID for me in the trunk, in my duffel."

Dean had a sudden thought and looked at the nurse, eyes widening as something she had said finally soaked in. "Did the Impala burn? The car?"

"I don't know," the nurse said, surprised. "The sheriff said it would take them hours to clear the road though, so I suppose it might have. He had to put up roadblocks until they can cut the vehicles apart in the morning, they couldn't do it with just the wrecker. He said that the tractor-trailer must have been going eighty when it hit you, and it didn't even try to stop."

Dean groaned and looked up at the ceiling again, blinking back tears. "Oh fuck _me_." His beautiful car had survived ten kinds of hell and more miles than a Greyhound, only to be _totaled_ in a wreck with a stupid asleep-at-the-wheel trucker. It was the story of his goddamned life. Make it through all the shit he had been terrified over for weeks only to have some random asshole _accidentally_ wipe out his world. "Just… Shit!"

A fire in the car would explain the sheriff not being there to lock down his room yet. If the car burned, all the extra IDs would have burned and it would take time for the car to cool enough that anyone could find the weapons, if it didn't just explode. They kept all kinds of volatile shit in the trunk, and Dean realized suddenly that he was very lucky the crash hadn't set it off and roasted him alive.

When Sam finally showed up - and he had to, Dean couldn't let himself consider any other possibility - Dean was going to kiss him, because he should have done that _weeks_ ago, and then he was going to beat Sam half to death for jumping out in front of a semi. Well, as soon as he could move, anyway. Just then he couldn't beat his way out of a wet paper bag, but he'd recover eventually and _then_ he would kick Sam's ass. Repeatedly.

The nurse frowned disapprovingly. The young man was obviously trying not to cry, and seemed to be more upset over the _car_ than he was over the friend who died. "I'm sorry." She paused and then asked a bit hesitantly, "I guess it was your car?"

"I loved that car and did most of the work on it. It belonged to Sam's brother. We went everywhere together until he died. I promised to take care of it when I promised to look after Sammy." _'And I didn't even lie to her that time,'_ Dean thought a bit hysterically. _'I must be losing my touch.'_

"I'm sorry," the nurse repeated, wondering how anyone could care that much about a car. "Is there anyone I can call for you?"

Bobby wasn't too far away and probably had connections enough to get Dean out of the hospital without sending him on a one-way trip to become some no-necked dude's prison bitch, but Dean dreaded even the _thought_ of having to call him. After getting his dog killed by that damned demon, Bobby might get Dean out just so he could shoot Dean himself. Bobby had loved that mean old mutt more than most people loved their kids.

"Sammy's pretty much all I have," Dean finally said softly after a minute or two, his voice a bit rough. He was utterly screwed if Sam didn't show up or send help to get him out of there. "We've both been alone a hell of a long time. He has family in Jersey, but he hasn't seen them since he was a little kid." He fell silent a moment, wondering if he should contact their aunt to let her know Dad had died, and then pushed away the idea. He wasn't up to listening to her hysterics, not until he knew Sam was safe. He looked back up at the nurse, half-asking, "No one has tried to see me? Or picked up a tall sweet-looking kid who needs a haircut?"

"It's only been a few hours since you were brought in, and no one else has been admitted tonight, child. This is a tiny hospital, if this Sam was here or had been here, I would know. No one knows you're here yet, I would think, except for the sheriff and the staff." She paused and then added, "Well, and the night dispatcher. She would know where you were taken after the accident, but I doubt she's had time to gossip with anyone about it. Everyone in town is asleep."

"Sammy knows I'm here. He has to," Dean murmured, closing his eyes again and clenching his jaw. His eyes were stinging, but he refused to cry in front of the nurse. He couldn't take it if she started fussing over him.

"I don't see how he could," the nurse said reasonably. "It hasn't been on the news and the paper won't have the story until tomorrow. The deputy was on his way home for the night when he found you, and Lonnie's sure to be too busy helping the Sheriff to run his mouth yet." She paused and then asked gently, "Do you know where Sam might have gone? Maybe the sheriff can find him."

Dean swallowed the lump in his throat again and then said through clenched teeth, " _He. Was. In. The. Car._ "

The nurse reached out and patted his shoulder gingerly. "Then I'm sure he'll show up, child. He probably got lost trying to walk into town to get help. You just rest, everything will be better tomorrow, you'll see."

 _'Tomorrow I'll likely be under guard_ ,' Dean thought despairingly. "Whatever you say, lady."

"Clarice," the nurse corrected. "Nurse Clarice Fitzgibbons. I'll be here until breakfast, if you need anything." She moved around the bed and adjusted something on the IV, then murmured, "You need to sleep. I'll come check on you soon, all right?"

"Okay."

Clarice patted his hand gently and then started towards the door, making it almost out of the room before she stopped and looked back. "I almost forgot! We don't even know your name, child."

"James Dean Riverson," Dean whispered, closing his eyes tightly. "My dad was a fan." That particular fake ID was one of Sam's stupider jokes, and thinking about it made him want to scream. The only good thing about it was that it explained any slipups if Sam called him Dean. It would get funny looks because it was the name of Sam's 'dead' brother, but they could explain it away as a childhood joke between them and 'Dean' that stuck. They had done it before.

The nurse watched Dean for a moment longer and then turned off the light and left him alone.

Dean opened his eyes again, staring up at the darkened ceiling as he stopped fighting so hard to control himself. The ceiling slowly blurred away, and he could feel hot tears running down into his hair as he whispered, "You have to be okay, Sammy."

 

~*~*~

 

The next time Dean woke up, he immediately knew that there was someone in the room with him. It took him only a moment to realize that the presence felt _very_ familiar. He lifted his head hurriedly to look around, ignoring the stab of pain the abrupt movement caused and blinking as he tried to focus his eyes. "Sammy?"

The blurry figure slumped in the chair across the room jerked and then jumped up to move quickly towards him him. "I'm here, Dean."

Dean blinked a few more times and then Sam's face swam into focus, worried and beat all to hell but very alive. Dean lifted his good hand, the IV twisting painfully as he whispered, "Sammy." He grabbed Sam's shirt and pulled Sam down roughly, ignoring the flaring pain in his chest and side. He pressed his face against Sam's hair as he whispered raggedly, "Thank God you're alive."

Sam gingerly laid one arm across Dean's waist, shifting closer to hug him very carefully as he repeated softly, "I'm here, Dean. I'm okay."

Dean held on to Sam's shirt like he was afraid to ever let go again, shaking as he tried to control himself. Sam _was_ there, safe and alive, and all of the fear and pain Dean had fought to ignore the last time he woke seemed to hit him at once. After a few moments he suddenly let out a soft, painful sob that was quickly followed by another even though it hurt so much he could hardly breathe. Dean was terribly ashamed to break down even in front of Sam, but he couldn't stop it.

Sam could count on one hand the number of times he had seen Dean cry, but he knew that even someone as controlled and tough as Dean had limits. Sam leaned across the bed to keep holding on to Dean despite the awkward angle, tears of his own soaking into the bandages on Dean's battered body as he realized how scared Dean must have been to wake up alone. Dean had been on the ragged edge of terror for _days_ before the accident, worrying over Sam and their Dad, and then to wake up alone with Dad dead and Sam missing… Well, Sam really wasn't very surprised that even Dean had finally reached his limit.

Sam held Dean until he quieted and his breathing evened out, then Sam finally pulled away gently. "You're the one who nearly died, Dean, not me. I just got a little banged up."

Dean held tightly to Sam's shirt, staring up into Sam's eyes as he muttered thickly, "As long as you're safe, Sammy, I don't care what happens to me."

Sam gently untangled Dean's fingers from his shirt and then took Dean's hand in his. He noticed the twisted IV then and carefully straightened it before smiling slightly at Dean even though his eyes were a little blurry with tears again. "Well, I do."

Dean's face crumpled slightly, but he got control of himself again almost immediately, his grip tightening on Sam's hand. "I was afraid I had lost you."

"Never," Sam said, reaching out to cup Dean's cheek in the palm of his free hand. "Takes more than a demon in a semi to get rid of me."

Dean let out a strangled little noise that wasn't quite another sob, blinking his eyes clear of tears so he could see Sam's face better. Sam was trying so hard to smile for him despite the worry and tears in his eyes, and Dean wanted suddenly to reassure Sam that he would be okay. He tried to lighten the mood, smiling crookedly as he murmured, "From what I was told, you can't say the same for my car. They said you killed her, Sammy."

"Yeah, I guess I did," Sam replied, letting out a little laugh even though his eyes were shining. "I'll have to find some way to make it up to you."

Dean could think of only one way for Sam to make it up to him, and he didn't give himself time to think it over before he murmured, "C'mere then." He waited for Sam to lean closer again and then pulled his hand out of Sam's grip to reach for the nape of Sam's neck, tugging him down into a sudden, desperate kiss. He had thought about kissing his little brother off and on for a long time, but he had been too worried he would lose Sam if he did to actually do it. He had been sure that Sam's obsession with being normal would make him reject the idea - and him - completely, but at that moment he couldn't make himself worry about the possibility.

Sam was too shocked to pull away, though Dean felt Sam shudder as he took advantage of Sam's surprise to prolong the kiss. Sam's lips tasted like tears and Dean could feel more falling on his face, but he didn't let go. He knew that if Sam really wanted to get away he had no prayer of holding him still.

Sam was there and alive and Dean was never going to let him out of his sight again, so Sam would have plenty of time to forgive him for taking a kiss he had no right to want. If Dean had been able to move more than his left arm without feeling like his chest would explode, he would have been holding Sam tight enough to bruise, too, so he figured Sam was getting off pretty lucky with just a kiss.

Dean knew that he was probably freaking Sam out royally, but he still couldn't make himself pull away for a long moment. He finally began to pull back, though, and then suddenly Sam let out a soft noise and was kissing Dean, one hand moving to cup the side of Dean's face again as he deepened the kiss. Dean heard a low needy whimper as he responded, and then when Sam groaned in reply he flushed as he realized that _he_ had been the one to whimper. He knew that he needed Sam like he needed air to breathe, but it was embarrassing to make it so obvious, even just to Sam.

"Oh, for Pete's sake!" a man's voice said suddenly, sounding harried and a little disgusted. "Get the 'oh my god we're alive' necking over with in a _hurry_ , boys. I'll be right back, and you'd better be ready to behave yourselves. I have things to do!"

Sam pulled away then, flushed and wide-eyed as he stared into Dean's eyes, more than a little breathless. "Dean? What-"

Dean was glad to see Sam wasn't crying anymore. He put his fingertips against Sam's lips, quieting him, then shifted his hand to cup Sam's cheek and gave him a crooked little smile. "Don't worry about the Impala, Sammy."

"But you loved that car," Sam protested softly. He barely realized he spoke in the past tense until he had already done it, but he didn't try to take it back. He remembered waking up in the road by the car with Dad's body crumpled across his legs, and even that first confused glance at the Impala had made it obvious the car would never be fit to drive again. He had never seen a car take so much damage without catching fire before, and in a lifetime of living on the road he had seen a lot of accidents.

"I can buy another damned car," Dean said firmly, then smirked just a bit. "Maybe an old Mustang. You always wanted one, and I won't be able to drive for a while with my arm and my leg screwed up."

Sam let out a soft little surprised laugh, his eyes sparkling. He leaned into Dean's touch, lifting his hand to cover Dean's on his cheek as he whispered, "I love you too, Dean." He figured that saying he loved Dean couldn't do anything but help Dean's peace of mind, even though he was sure Dean would tease him about it.

Dean didn't tease him though, instead smiling a little wider. "You'd better. You're gonna have help me out until I can walk again. Using crutches would be a real bitch the way my ribs feel right now."

"I think I can do that," Sam replied, chuckling slightly. Dean seemed oblivious to the fact that he sounded stronger than he had before they kissed, but that proved to Sam just how much Dean had needed it. "You definitely don't need to drive a busted rib through a lung or something."

The man who had spoken before bustled in again and said firmly, "Then the first thing you need to do, Sam, is stop encouraging him to move!" Dean and Sam both finally looked towards the door to see a harried looking doctor walking towards them. "He's lucky to be alive at all, and he won't last long if he doesn't rest and heal. You proved you're both alive, now behave yourselves or I'll tell Clarice not to let you in here."

"Yes sir." Sam looked sheepish as he pulled Dean's hand back down to rest on the bed, but he didn't let go. He looked across the bed at the doctor as he laced his fingers with Dean's, giving the doctor his best sweet smile. "He'll rest, Doctor Keller, even if I have to tie him down."

"Ooh, kinky," Dean said, eyes sparkling as he smirked up at Sam. He wasn't at all surprised that Sam and the doctor had already met. Sam always tracked down whoever knew the most about his injuries when Dean got banged up badly enough to need professional help.

Sam let out a surprised laugh and blushed very red. He hadn't really thought about what Dean kissing him might mean about Dean's state of mind, but that comment made it obvious. Sam wasn't sure exactly what it said about _him_ that he wasn't freaked out by the idea, but it didn't really seem important at the moment so he didn't try to figure it out. He had learned a long time ago that he would kill without hesitation to protect Dean, and murder _had_ to be worse than anything else that might happen between them.

The doctor snorted and started to check Dean's vitals, muttering to himself, "Stupid kids, always cracking up your cars and getting each other killed. It was a wonder the human race has survived so long, hurtling around in fiberglass and tinfoil."

"Detroit steel, doc," Dean said, frowning a bit. "My baby was a _classic_ , not some little Matchbox car."

Doctor Keller gave him a quelling look. "You're lucky that you were in such an old car, boy! The sheriff showed me photos of the accident scene, and you boys should _both_ be thanking the good Lord you're breathing! By all rights your injuries should have killed you, and even your survival hardly compares to how lucky your friend was! I have never in all my forty years as a surgeon seen someone _walk away_ from an accident like that."

"God wanted us to stick around," Sam said quietly, looking down at Dean. "We've got things left to do."

Dean looked up at Sam, squeezing his hand. "Yeah, Sammy, we do."

The doctor just snorted again and shook his head.

 

~*~*~

 

Dean had to pester Sam for quite a while before Sam finally gave in and told him exactly what happened that night.

Sam woke up in the road after the accident with their Dad's body slumped against his legs, still warm. Sam thought Dad had gotten him out of the car, but he wouldn't say anything more about it even when Dean begged him. Sam's worst injuries were the gash and concussion he got when his head hit the upright behind the driver's door. He also had a broken toe that he got trying to kick the quarter-panel back from the edge of the rear driver's side door of the car, but he didn't really count it as an injury from the wreck. He knew better than to kick anything toe-first.

After Sam realized their Dad was dead, he had scrambled up to look for Dean, dreading the worst. The car was so bent and buckled that Sam couldn't climb over the front seat without landing on Dean, so he had to go through the door. The Impala's frame was warped so badly that the rear door was jammed, and it took Sam what seemed like forever to buckle the rear quarter panel far enough that the door could scrape open.

By the time Sam finally climbed into the back to try and help Dean, he was very nearly panicked because the noise hadn't awakened Dean. The black leather seats were sticky with blood everywhere Sam touched and Dean's breathing was labored and shallow, bubbling noisily because of a punctured lung. Sam had used a wadded-up t-shirt to staunch the worst of the bleeding in Dean's leg, but he was afraid he'd hurt Dean worse than he already was if he tried to move him without the help of a paramedic.

Sam's cell was crushed in the wreck and he couldn't find Dean's, so Sam took off down the road as fast as he could move. He didn't remember much about the road, just running on asphalt in the dark, terrified that Dean would die before he could get help. He was still trying to find somewhere he could use the phone when he was hit so suddenly by a vision that he stumbled and fell, hitting his head and then tumbling off the road into a drainage ditch.

The sheriff spotted Sam in the ditch just after dawn and brought him in, exhausted still and covered with blood from a dozen cuts he had ignored, but mostly whole. While the doctor was stitching up the gash on Sam's forehead, one of the nurses mentioned how their other accident victim was so worried about Sam that she thought he might hurt himself. Sam had immediately begun to beg his way into Dean's room, reassuring the doctor and nurses that he wouldn't get in the way.

The doctor had agreed reluctantly, but Clarice bullied Sam into the bathroom to clean up and made him eat some breakfast before she finally took him to see Dean. Sam had begged to stay even though visiting hours didn't begin until ten, and Clarice finally said she would see what she could do. She was due to go off-shift then, so she had left to arrange it with the other nurses. Sam spent a long time standing by Dean's bed before he finally gave in to his own exhaustion and went to sit in the room's only chair, which was fastened to the floor in the far corner.

Sam had settled down in the chair to watch Dean sleep, and he soon found himself thinking about God for the first time in a long while. He didn't believe like he had when he was younger, not really, but he didn't want to take the chance that there might be someone listening who could help his brother if he just swallowed his pride and asked. He spent the morning watching Dean breathe so shallowly that it scared him, praying fervently for the first time since Jess died.

The only relevant prayer that came to mind had been one John had taught them when they were learning Latin, ' _Veni Creator_ '. It was a prayer for peace and strength against a hellish foe, and Sam thought it was pretty fitting. They needed peace and strength very badly just then, and protection from the demon that would surely be after them again before long. He wasn't at all convinced the prayer would help, but he couldn't completely discount the possibility either, not after exorcising so many demons over the years.

He was still praying when he finally dozed off, so exhausted that even the uncomfortable chair he was in couldn't keep him awake.

 

~*~*~

 

Clarice took Sam home with her two days after the accident to get some real rest, but it didn't work out as she had planned.

Sam woke screaming almost as soon as he fell asleep, and Clarice had barely gotten him calmed when the phone rang. It was the day nurse at the hospital calling to let her know that Dean had done the same and that he insisted on speaking to Sam before he would even try to sleep again. Clarice reluctantly handed Sam the phone, and then left him to talk quietly on the phone with Dean until Sam finally dozed off, exhausted.

Clarice found Sam clutching the phone when she checked on him a little while later, and when she checked the phone she was glad to hear nothing but soft even breathing from Dean. She hung up and left Sam to get the sleep she knew he desperately needed, but within minutes Sam woke up screaming again. She got a call from the hospital before Sam was even fully awake to tell her Dean had woken so violently that he had cracked the cast on his arm, and that he was asking for Sam again.

Clarice didn't know what to make of the fact that the boys seemed to be having nightmares at the same time even though they were over a mile away from each other, but after she watched Sam calm Dean down and talk him into resting again she decided that fixing it should be pretty simple. Sam had been sleeping in a chair in Dean's hospital room for two days and neither had woken up screaming, so she thought letting them stay together would likely put a stop to it. She took Sam back to the hospital to speak to the head nurse, who had already been charmed by Sam's sweet smile, and soon Sam had permission to stay with Dean.

The nurses thought Sam and Dean were lovers because of how devoted they were and the kiss the doctor witnessed, and most of them seemed to think it was romantic that they couldn't bear to be apart even when they slept. It embarrassed Sam and Dean when the nurses teased them or talked about how sweet they were together, but they wanted - _needed_ \- to be together too badly to correct the impression.

 

~*~*~

 

Sam camped out in one corner of Dean's room, sleeping on a too-short cot one of the nurses found for him and doing much of their work for them as he watched over Dean. It didn't take him long to realize that the accident had done much more than make them both orphans. Something - whether it was the demon, the single intense kiss they had shared, or simply a new facet of Sam's abilities that had been brought on by all the stress - had linked them as inextricably as if they had been chained together.

Sam couldn't leave the room while Dean was asleep without Dean waking, and Dean could hardly flinch without Sam knowing he was in pain, but neither of them complained. Sam could feel how badly Dean was hurting and, though Dean didn't admit it, he could sometimes feel Sam's worry for him the same way. The unexpected flashes of emotion were a little hard to get used to, but their new rapport wasn't all that had changed.

The accident had definitely shattered Dean's world, and it took him days to put himself back together again. His emotional walls, which had once been so firm that Sam sometimes wondered if Dean even _felt_ emotions like normal people, seemed to be the hardest for Dean to recover. Dean no longer complained if Sam hovered over him, and sometimes there was a vulnerable look in his eyes that Sam hadn't ever seen before. Dean had depths of feeling that he had kept hidden so well that Sam had never suspected they were there, and Sam found himself having to rethink some of his views about his brother.

The kiss Sam and Dean had shared the day after the accident hadn't been repeated, and Sam steadfastly refused to think about it or admit to himself that it hadn't been in the least bit platonic. He had almost convinced himself that the accident and losing Dad had prompted Dean's behavior and his own response, and that it would never happen again. The accident definitely qualified as traumatic stress as far as Sam was concerned, and people did crazy things when they were recovering from something like that.

Most of a week passed before Sam finally recognized one of the seldom-seen - at least, until the accident - emotions that was so plain in Dean's eyes sometimes afterwards. He immediately began trying to convince himself that he hadn't seen Dean looking at him with so much love and need. He had spent half his life sure that he didn't have a prayer of ever being anything but 'little Sammy' to Dean, and he didn't want to let himself even hope that might change.

It had been years since Sam accepted that the desire he had felt for Dean since he was thirteen would never be returned, and after he met Jess he had _finally_ stopped thinking about it every time he looked at Dean. Then, of course, Sam's world was shattered and he was thrown back into the Impala with Dean. The night Dean kissed him had brought it all crashing back, at least as strong as ever.

Sam found himself thinking about Dean almost constantly, which was awkward with the new link between their minds. He was sure Dean was going to give him shit about it sooner or later, but it didn't happen.

 

~*~*~

 

Almost a week after the accident, Sam was sitting at the foot of Dean's bed late one night, watching him sleep and thinking about what they should do next. Some small noise in the hallway caught Sam's attention and he was grateful for the distraction as he looked towards the door. He expected to see a nurse walk in, but no one opened it and after a moment he looked back at Dean.

"Sam, why aren't you asleep?" Dean murmured with a sleepy smile, his voice a little husky and rough with sleep.

Sam smiled and shrugged slightly. "I was too restless."

Dean's lips twitched into a crooked grin. "If it didn't hurt like hell to move, I'd help you with that."

Sam blinked and then blushed as it dawned on him what Dean was hinting at. He hadn't been thinking about that, not this time, but Dean's comment made it even more likely that Dean had some idea what was going on in his head. "That's not what I meant."

Dean let out a breathy little chuckle, trying not to laugh and jar his ribs, and then teased, "Are you sure? You've been with me almost every minute for weeks. Even you have to be needing a little relief by now, Sammy, unless you've been enjoying your showers a little more than I thought."

Sam's blush got even worse. "I'm used to doing without, _you're_ the one who thinks you have to get laid once a day and twice on Sunday."

Dean pouted, completely aware of how comical it looked. "Don't remind me. I haven't gotten any in _weeks_. By the time I'm healed up, I'll have forgotten _how_."

"I doubt it," Sam replied, snickering.

Dean shoved Sam lightly with his left foot, grinning a bit even though his eyes were serious. "C'mon, Sammy, tell me what you were thinking about so hard. I _know_ you were brooding."

Sam was smiling a bit as he glanced down at his knee, shrugging. "Nothing important. I was just thinking."

Dean snorted softly. "I'd whap you upside the head if I could reach you. Stop lying to me and tell me what's on your mind."

Sam looked up, staring into Dean's eyes for a moment before he said very quietly, "You don't want to hear it, Dean."

"Yes, I do. That's why I _asked_."

Sam tried to think of where to begin for a few moments and then asked simply, "Why did you kiss me?"

"Because I wanted to," Dean replied immediately, amused.

Sam let out a soft little surprised laugh. He should have expected an answer so simple, really. It _was_ Dean that he was talking to. 'Want, find, take' was his _modus operandi_ for a lot of things.

Dean just smirked, and after a few moments Sam said with a smile, "I'm serious, Dean. I need to know."

The expression in Dean's eyes shifted to something soft and gentle even though the smirk didn't change a bit. "So am I, Sammy. I've wanted to kiss you for a while now, but I was too chickenshit to do anything about it." His left shoulder twitched in a slight shrug as the smirk finally faded into a serious expression. "I spent a lot of time the night of the accident thinking I had lost you. It made me realize how much I'd regret it if I got a second chance and didn't take it. I knew it might freak you out, but then again it might not, and, well…" Dean gave him that crooked smile again. "It was worth the risk."

Sam just stared at Dean, completely at a loss for words.

Dean was just beginning to think that Sam finally _was_ going to freak out on him about the whole 'incest' thing when Sam suddenly asked, "How long?"

Dean swallowed hard but his gaze didn't waver from Sam's eyes as he flushed a bit and admitted, "A long time. I tried to convince myself that it was just because I was with you all the time, but I sort of knew I was lying to myself. You wouldn't have been ready for anything then even if I wasn't your brother, so it's good that I didn't say anything." He paused and then added a bit hesitantly, "I don't expect anything to change. I know you want the whole 'normal life' gig with the picket fence and the pretty wife and kids and a yappy little dog. I can't ever give you that." _'No matter how much I wish I could, Sammy_ ,' Dean added silently.

Sam leaned forward to reach for Dean's left hand as he murmured, "I'd rather have you."

Dean's eyes widened, but he gripped Sam's hand tightly. For Sam to say that Dean was more important to him than that life Sam had always dreamed of shook Dean to the core. Sam had always run from him, always wanted 'normal' with a house and family and a 'real' job instead of living out of a duffle, and Dean had always known he could never give that to him. He stared at Sam in silence for several minutes and then took a slow shaky breath before he asked very softly, "You want to run that by me again?"

Sam slipped off the bed without releasing Dean's hand, moving to lean over him. "I _said_ I'd rather have you." He bent to brush his lips against Dean's and then pulled away just enough to give him a bright-eyed grin that Dean hadn't seen in weeks. "Someone finally managed to convince me that normal's pretty overrated."

Dean let out a soft little laugh. "Glad you're finally listening to me on that one, baby brother."

Dean leaned up slightly, obviously wanting a kiss, but Sam pulled away to give him a dirty look. "Okay, no, before we do _anything_ else, we have to agree on one thing."

"What's that?" Dean asked, bemused. "No fucking in public?"

Sam blinked, blushing suddenly. "Two things, then."

Dean snickered, flinching only a little at a twinge in his ribs. "And the other one is?"

"Reminding me that you're my brother and I'm _so_ going to Hell for how much I want you is _not_ the way to get laid."

Dean started laughing, groaning in pain at the way it made his ribs ache and letting go of Sam's hand to clutch his side. "Oh, damn you! Don't make me laugh, Sammy!"

Sam looked a little sheepish. "Sorry?"

Dean rode out several more painful gasps of laughter before he spoke again. "No, you aren't, you ass." He held very still and tried not to think of anything funny until the stabbing pains in his ribs stopped, then smiled at Sam as he added, "But I'll try. Okay?"

"Okay," Sam agreed, smiling. "I'll remind you."

Dean smirked suddenly, green eyes sparkling as he asked slyly, "Does that mean I'm going to get laid if I remember _not_ to use the dreaded b-word?"

"Not this week," Sam replied with a surprised laugh, barely resisting the urge to cuff the side of Dean's head. He turned to walk towards his cot as he added, "And the way you're going, next week isn't looking too good, either."

Dean groaned theatrically and pouted, even though his eyes were still sparkling happily. "I'm gonna have the worst case of blue balls known to _man_ by the time I get out of this damned hospital, aren't I?"

"Maybe." Sam sat on his cot and smirked at Dean. "But just think, now you have something to look forward to when we leave."

"Gee, thanks," Dean replied dryly. "What would I ever do without you?"

"I dunno," Sam said, still smirking, "but I'm not gonna give you the chance to find out."

"Good."

 

~*~*~

 

By the middle of the second week after the accident, the vague echoes of each other's feelings Sam and Dean sometimes felt had strengthened. They soon could feel every emotion the other did if they tried to, though they didn't get the thoughts behind the emotion. It wasn't until after they had spent several days trying to get it under conscious control that Sam realized the effort was just making the rapport stronger. It was obviously too late by then to ignore it and hope it would go away, so they decided to just live with it and see what happened.

The utter lack of privacy, even in their own minds, was rough on them both sometimes, but it did more to bind them together than blood ever had.

Dean had felt like he wasn't important enough for even his own family to want to be with him for years, but the new rapport between them changed that. Feeling just exactly how Sam felt about him healed something in Dean's heart that had been raw and painful for a very long time. Sam's concern and love was so vivid in Dean's mind most of the time that Dean soon stopped teasing Sam about being a sap or hovering over the bed every time Dean flinched. He finally knew that Sam worried over him so much because Sam really did love him to distraction.

Dean wasn't the only one learning about his brother, though. They had both grown up in a hard school where tears were never permissible and being emotional over anything was strongly discouraged, but they had dealt with it very differently. Sam had grown defiant and didn't even try to follow the rules most of the time, making a point of stating how he felt about things, but Dean had taught himself young to put on a 'brave face' and hide everything.

Dean never actually said he loved Sam, but the new link between their minds let Sam feel the depth of love and need that Dean kept hidden behind his smirks and sarcasm. Sam had always thought that Dean's constant teasing was done out of affection, but _feeling_ the love and amusement that usually motivated it was still a bit of a shock sometimes.

Sam really hadn't ever had any clue that Dean was so pleased just to be with him, even when they weren't doing anything but watching TV or playing the video games one of the nurses had brought in to try and keep Dean in bed when he started talking about leaving. It amazed Sam every time he felt how much Dean loved him and needed him, and made him more determined than ever to stay with Dean no matter what.

It made Sam feel guilty for ever walking away from Dean, but it also made him determined never to make that mistake again. Nothing that Sam had found while trying to live a normal life - not even Jess - was worth what he finally knew that Dean felt when Dean gave him that sweet, open smile and reached for his hand.

 

~*~*~

 

When a vision hit three weeks after the accident, Sam and Dean both saw the woman and her child die, both _felt_ it even, and they both felt the utter terror that their brother would be next. They woke gasping at the same time, both of them shaking and sweating.

Sam laid in his cot for a little while just listening to Dean breathe and waiting for the headache to begin, but for some reason it didn't. After a little while Sam silently stood and walked over to sit on the edge of the bed, looking into Dean's eyes. There was a good chance he would accidentally hurt Dean if he gave in to the urge he suddenly had to lay down next to Dean, so he limited himself to just reaching for Dean's hand.

Dean didn't make a smart remark as Sam had half expected him to, instead meeting Sam's hand with his own and then giving Sam's hand a squeeze. Dean wouldn't admit it out loud, couldn't, but he needed the reassurance of Sam's touch almost as much as Sam did.

They sat there in silence for a long while before Dean finally spoke up softly. "I don't know how you can stand that, Sammy."

"I wasn't given any choice," Sam replied after a moment, looking at the way the dim lighting highlighted the bone structure of Dean’s face. The mostly covered night light by the door shed the only light in the room, lending a bit of a blue cast to everything. "It happens, and I – _we_ now, I guess - have to live with it. At least there wasn't a migraine afterwards this time."

Dean absently stroked his thumb across the back of Sam's hand for a moment before he murmured softly, "I wish I had known how intense it is. I wouldn't have given you so much shit about it."

Sam smiled and shifted to hold Dean's hand in both of his. "Yes, you would."

Dean's lips twitched. "Well, I would have _tried_ not to."

"And it's the thought that counts, lucky for you."

Dean laughed softly. "Bitch."

Sam smirked suddenly, eyes sparkling. "Maybe sometimes, but you ain't getting any."

Dean's eyes widened and he laughed again, wincing only a little because of his ribs. "Sammy! I can't believe you said that!"

Sam blinked innocently at Dean, hardly even aware of the way he was stroking the inside of Dean's wrist with his fingertips. "What?"

Dean snorted, lips twitching. "Don't tease me, Sam."

"Tease you?" Sam was doing his sweet and innocent act, except for the fact he was still playing with Dean's wrist.

Dean's _very sensitive_ wrist. That was attached to a body that hadn't been laid in about a month. "Yes, tease me!" Dean shook free of Sam's hands, pretending to swat at them. "I'm getting so horny that even Shelly's starting to look good, and here you are getting all touchy-feely and then saying no."

Sam rolled his eyes, ignoring the touchy-feely comment. "Dean, that's just wrong. She's what, twelve?"

"Hell, I don't know," Dean replied, amused. "But she fills out that candy striper uniform of hers in all the right places."

Sam snorted. "Twelve. With _braces_."

"Braces can be worked around," Dean replied, trying to seem like he had really considered it even though he was mostly just messing with Sam. "Every other woman I've seen in the last month was old enough to be my grandma. You ought to be glad Clarice isn't starting to look good."

"Eww." Sam wrinkled his nose, disgusted. "Just, a whole world of no."

Dean couldn't keep a straight face anymore and snickered. "Damn, Sammy. I could tell you I had the hots for that crotchety old broad you complain about in the cafeteria and you'd probably believe it!"

Sam blinked and then reached out to swat the side of Dean's head lightly. "Jerk!"

Dean snickered. "You said that already, Sammy." Sam gave him a dirty look and Dean grinned impishly, teasing, "What, do you think I should be looking around for someone? Changing your mind on me?"

Sam rolled his eyes, trying not to let his amusement show. "Of course, that's it, Dean. Ten years wasn't long enough to get over wanting you, but two weeks in a hospital room did the trick."

Dean blinked, eyes widening a bit. "Dude. You have got to learn to step up and take what you want."

Sam laughed. "Oh yeah, that would have gone over _really_ well. I can just see me walking up to you when you were sixteen and saying, 'Dean, I've been having wet dreams about you, can we screw around?'" He snickered, patting Dean's hand. "Not in this lifetime, man. I like my nose just like it is."

Dean blinked again, bemused. "I wouldn't have decked you." Sam gave him a skeptical look and Dean grinned. "Well, not as long as you didn't say it _in front of_ anyone. I probably would have just bought you a hooker."

"Dean, in case you never noticed? I don't really like girls all that much," Sam said, amused.

Dean's eyebrows went up. "What about Jess?"

"Jess was special." Sam shrugged one shoulder. "Besides, she reminded me of you."

Dean tried not to show how it made him feel to hear Sam say that, though his eyes totally gave it away. "And that girl with the paintings?"

Sam laughed softly. "Dean, didn't you ever wonder why you and Sarah got along so well?"

"She seemed like a smart girl, but other than that, no."

Sam's lips twitched. "You two are so alike it was scary, and you sitting on the sidelines cheering me on didn't help any." He grinned suddenly as he mimicked, " _'Marry that girl, Sammy.'_ "

Dean grinned.  "Well, she was cool. Hell of a lot better than that Meg dame."

Sam let out a little surprised laugh. "Hell is right."

Dean reached for Sam's hand, taking it in his and then rubbing his thumb along Sam's knuckles. "All that bad luck you've had, maybe you should just stick to playing for the other team."

Sam rolled his eyes again, amused. "I plan to."

"Oh yeah?" Dean half-asked, smirking a bit. "Gonna play the field, or did you have someone in particular in mind?"

"One particular someone, but I'm not going to let him fuck himself to death, no matter how much he might like that idea."

Dean grinned wickedly. "You gotta admit though, Sammy. What a way to go."

Sam laughed again, standing up and letting go of Dean's hand as he turned away. "Go back to sleep, Dean."

"Admit it, Sammy. It sounds like fun to you, too."

Sam got settled in his too-short cot again, his feet dangling over the end, then suddenly let out a little laugh. "Okay, maybe, but not tonight." He grinned. "I have a headache."

Dean snickered. "Liar."

"Go to sleep."

"Yes dear," Dean said in an over-sweet voice, then snickered and raised his good hand to bat away the pillow Sam threw at him.

"Sleep!" Sam said, trying not to laugh.

"Okay, okay!"

They were both asleep but smiling when the night nurse made her rounds at four.

 

~*~*~

 

Missouri called them at the hospital less than an hour after dawn the next day and told them that they would die and so would she if Sam and Dean didn't move in with her immediately and stay at least until the end of September. Sam and Dean didn't want to endanger her by attracting the demon's attention to her, but they couldn't really argue that she was wrong. The phone number for Dean's room had come to her in the same vision as the knowledge the three of them had to be together within a week or all of them would die.

Dean and Sam left the hospital the next day, despite the vehement protests of the staff members who had grown to care for them. Dean's broken leg had been put into a walking cast when the deep wound on his calf healed enough that the cast wouldn't make it worse, and he was able to get around on his own if he used crutches. It hurt like hell because of his ribs, but Dean refused to let a little pain stop him. He had broken ribs before and knew they would continue to heal anyway as long as he didn't do anything stupid like wrestle with another demon.

Clarice volunteered to take the boys to the bus station, and she was shocked when Dean wanted to go see the Impala instead. She didn't argue with the idea even though she had half expected them to visit the grave of their 'friend', John. They drove in silence to the junkyard where the Impala had been taken and then she sat in the car and watched as Sam and Dean slowly made their way over the rutted ground to the car. They were soon out of sight among the other wrecks, leaving her with her memories of how close Dean had come to crying when she told him the car was totaled. After a few minutes she decided that for the boys, especially Dean, visiting the car was probably very like visiting a grave.

Sam had dreaded showing Dean what had happened to the car, but there was really nothing he could do to help soften the impact. Dean was nearly overwhelmed by the pain he felt when he saw what was left of his ‘baby’, so much so that _Sam's_ eyes filled with tears. The Impala was the only home Dean had ever really had, the only thing that had been completely his besides his weapons and his clothes, and one glance told him that the car was unsalvageable. Dean could work miracles with repairs, but there was only so far a warped frame could be bent back into shape without snapping it completely.

Somehow, the Impala had kept them both alive, even though the car would never roll again. The leather seats were ripped and split with frighteningly large splotches of dried blood on them, the benches buckled and twisted just like the frame. There was little left in one piece except for the driver's door and the seat where Sam had been. There was so much dried blood and jagged, sharp metal in the back where Dean had been that he finally understood why everyone said it was a miracle he survived at all.

Watching Dean stand there on his crutches and stare at the mangled, twisted metal made something inside Sam break. He was holding Dean before he realized it, kissing his hair and whispering apologies and reassurances, and Dean's fragile control shattered. He leaned against Sam and they both cried for a long while.

 

~*~*~

 

Sam had been the one to retrieve their things from the tiny sheriff's office. He was surprised at how quickly the sheriff accepted his story that the weapons in the trunk all belonged to Logan, but then the sheriff told Sam that John's pickup had been found with a similar cache of weapons in it. The sheriff didn't actually _say_ that he thought Sam and Dean, who Sam had overheard him refer to as 'those two pretty fags', couldn't possibly be as dangerous as the scruffy, dangerous-looking dead man with no past, but it was implied so obviously that Sam couldn’t possibly miss it.

Telling the police that Logan owned the guns in the Impala made it impossible to get their weapons back, except for Dean's pearl-handled .40 caliber automatic. Dean had actually bought it legally from a gunsmith and a trace showed it registered in his name, so it wasn't that unusual for Sam to have it. Sam made up a story about his brother being a gun collector, and told the sheriff that the automatic was the only gun Sam had kept from Dean's collection.

The sheriff hadn't liked that Sam was so insistent on getting that particular gun back, but Sam looked so earnest that the sheriff let him have it. It helped that Sam actually had a concealed carry permit, something Dean had never bothered with, and that Sam was so good at pretending to be innocent. He acted a little afraid of the gun when it was given to him, handling it with exaggerated care and checking the safety before he tucked it away in his pocket even though it wasn't loaded. By the time Sam had the gun out of sight, the sheriff was convinced that Sam would put it right back where he had found it, tucked into one of the duffels, and leave it there.

The police had cleaned out the car and confiscated almost everything except for their clothes. The sheriff was curious as to why there were only two bags for the three who were in the car, so Sam told him that Logan's clothes were all stolen with his truck. That left the gun cleaning kit and the expensive knives in Dean's duffle to explain, but the sheriff didn't bother to push once Sam said that John gave them the knives to pay them back for the ride. The sheriff didn't find anything on Sam or 'James' except for a couple of speeding tickets and a charge of drunk and disorderly from a bar fight over a year ago, so he decided to give the boys the benefit of the doubt.

The sheriff insisted that Sam go through their things right there in his office so Sam could sign a form stating it was all there. Sam wasn't surprised the knives were gone and knew Dean would miss them, but he thought Dean might be mollified by the presence of the gun cleaning kit Dad gave him when he was thirteen. Sam put Dean's gun back in the bag without thinking about it when he was repacking everything, wrapping it securely in one of Dean's oldest t-shirts and tucking it into the bottom of the bag with the cleaning kit, then folding the other clothes neatly and putting them in on top.

When Sam looked up afterwards he noticed that the sheriff was grinning, but the sheriff didn't comment and Sam decided not to ask what was so funny. He had a feeling he didn't want to know. Dean always teased him about the way he packed a bag and said he was 'neat as a girl', and it wouldn't surprise him at all if the sheriff was thinking along the same lines.

Sam moved on to checking out his own bag, but he wasn't surprised that it didn't seem to have anything missing. He had never kept anything questionable in it except the wicked-looking custom knife Dean had given him when he was sixteen. The knife had been lost during a fight with a werewolf months ago, so there was nothing for the sheriff to ask about.

When Sam seemed to be done, the sheriff asked if that was everything from the car, and Sam pretended to think. It took him a few minutes to work up the nerve to ask if the police had found a laptop case, but the sheriff was quick to tell him that they hadn't seen one. It finally dawned on Sam then that he had taken the laptop inside with him when they stopped at Bobby's house, and he realized he must have left it there. He pretended to be upset about losing it for the sheriff’s benefit, but he had never been so glad he lost something in his life. There was enough incriminating evidence with his laptop to put them both in jail for a very long time.

The sheriff finally gave Sam permission to see the car then, though he assured Sam that he and his deputy had already gotten everything. The sheriff gave Sam a ride out to the salvage yard and let him go see the car, and it wasn't very hard for Sam to break down and cry. He asked for some time alone with the car, and the sheriff was so disgusted by a grown man blubbering that he said he'd wait in his car. Sam waited until the sheriff was out of sight and then checked all of the hiding places he knew of, but he wasn't surprised that he didn't find much besides a few small rolls of cash. He knew that Dean had kept many of the Impala's hiding places secret even from him.

The day that Dean finally got to see the Impala was two weeks later, and it took Sam and Dean a long while to recover from Dean's reaction to seeing the car. When Dean finally pulled himself together again, he asked Sam to help him retrieve a few things. He spent the next ten minutes telling Sam quietly how to open each hiding place and then watching Sam empty them, tucking the things Sam found into his pockets.

Dean had stowed away all sorts of things in the Impala over the years, but one of the hiding places Sam hadn't known about, that no one but Dean knew of, had held his most precious possessions. A cubbyhole behind a false panel under the trunk's lock where Sam never would have thought to look held an envelope full of photos and a bandana folded around a locket and Mary's wedding ring, all tucked into three layers of Ziploc bags to keep them dry. Sam wanted to look at the photos and see what memories were so precious to Dean that he would hide them away even from him, but Dean just snatched the small bundle out of his hands and told him not to be nosy.

Dean was quick to distract Sam with emptying out other hiding places. The trunk light, which had seldom worked reliably, came off when twisted just the right way to reveal a space large enough to hold a thick roll of cash. Under the driver's seat, the rug pulled up to reveal a compartment that held the first automatic Dad had ever given to Sam, a Browning Hi-Power .45 that Sam recognized immediately even though he knew Dad had told Dean to hock it years ago. In front of the driver's door under the dash, one of the plastic panels hid another compartment with more cash and a small bag of expensive-looking jewelry that made Dean flush and mutter something about not wasting it.

There were two other hiding places buried within the twisted metal of the passenger side of the car that Dean said held his old Colt 1911 and more money, but they didn't try to get them out. They could have borrowed tools and pried the seat and the twisted frame apart, of course, but neither of them suggested it. Everything on the passenger side seemed to be covered in their father's blood and neither wanted the gun or the money badly enough to touch it.

Once Dean was sure Sam had gotten everything they could, he asked Sam to take off the front license plate for him. Sam felt stupid kneeling there in the dirt while he fought the stubborn old screws with his Swiss Army knife, fumbling through something he knew Dean could have done in seconds before he was hurt, but Dean didn't comment on it. Dean was too emotionally and physically exhausted by then to do anything but silently wait for Sam to finish.

When the plate was removed, Dean tucked the thin metal sheet into the rear waistband of his jeans up under his old leather jacket, which he still wore even though it was a little ragged and had stains that couldn't be passed off as anything but blood. He ran his hand over the buckled hood one last time, looking at the car for only a moment longer before he smiled at Sam and said that it was time to go. Sam walked silently next to Dean as he limped away from his baby, and Sam did the crying for both of them.

Later that night, curled up together in a hotel bed a few hundred miles away, Sam told Dean that he had never seen him do anything more impressive.

 

~*~*~

 

Waiting for the cast to be removed from his leg was the longest six weeks of Dean's life. He spent some time at first tracking down their few friends out of sheer boredom, but it didn't take long for him to realize it was a bad idea. He found obituaries more often than he found anything else, but word had circulated fast amongst their surviving acquaintances that the Winchester brothers were bad luck. People that Sam and Dean had known all their lives told Dean not to ever contact them again, and one man threatened to shoot them on sight so they couldn't get him killed.

Dean stopped trying to contact their friends the day that he noticed that Sam was sitting curled up on the couch nearby with a book about warding spells, crying silently. Sam could feel Dean's pain and guilt at finding out so many of their friends were gone, and he didn't have Dean's iron control to protect him from it. It was a little eerie to have Sam react when Dean was the one upset, but somehow it helped Dean to cope. He had spent years bottling up his emotions behind walls sometimes _he_ couldn't even get through, and it reassured him to know that Sam could see right through to the heart of him. It was hard for Dean to say how he felt because Dad had drilled it into him so deeply never to show weakness, not to anyone, but Sam didn't need Dean to show anything anymore.

It was rough to realize they really had no one but each other and Missouri, but it made things easier, too. As long as they stayed with Missouri they could protect her, and Missouri insisted that they would be safe as long as they lived in her home. Missouri sometimes disappeared for days on end on errands she didn't see fit to explain beyond a note saying not to worry, so Sam and Dean got used to being alone together in the house. The inactivity and the lack of people bugged Dean, but he tried not to complain. Even he could see that leaving the house before he was completely healed up would be beyond stupid.

Sam found plenty to do around Missouri's old house, which had needed repair for years, but he wouldn't let Dean help most of the time. Dean soon began to spend his time hunting down rumors on the internet and making notes, watching online boards Sam had gotten tips from before and checking in with the few people who would talk to him. It wasn't what Dean wanted to be doing, but it kept his mind occupied so he wouldn't go utterly stir-crazy before the last cast was removed.

It didn't take Dean long to find out that the demon was killing women again, more than ever before, but Sam wouldn't even consider trying to track it down. Sam wasn't having visions anymore and told Dean that he wasn't going to hunt _anything_ until Dean was completely recovered. Dean tried to argue until Sam pointed out that he would probably get killed trying to protect Dean if they went out with Dean barely able to walk, which made Dean give in without another word.

Dean knew that his injuries had left him slow and fragile and he didn't want to endanger Sam, no matter how bored and antsy he was. He finally accepted that it would probably take a very long time for him to heal, and resigned himself to staying hidden behind so many wards that even he could always feel them in the air. It took him weeks to figure out that at least one of the wards traveled with him when he moved, and hours after that to notice the delicate tracery of scratches on his ring.

Dean occupied himself for two days looking things up and trying to decipher the symbols before he finally had the bright idea to check the book Bobby had given Sam. Within fifteen minutes of flipping through it he knew that the symbols were protection runes, strong ones that should keep a demon from being able to possess him as long as he wore them. He asked Sam if he wore something similar as soon as he figured it out, rightly sure that Sam had been the one to mark his ring, but Sam hadn't bothered to make anything for himself.

Dean pulled Missouri aside that evening and asked her to go into town for him. After she returned from her trip to the jewelers, Dean spent hours painstakingly penciling the same runes on to the inner surface of the silver ID bracelet she had bought for him. The next day he carefully carved the runes into the silver with a small electric etching tool Missouri bought for him from the same jeweler, and then that night after Sam fell asleep he put the bracelet on Sam's wrist.

The sweet smile Sam gave him the next morning was worth every bit of work Dean had put into it and then some. The fact that Sam was safer wearing the bracelet was just icing on the cake.

 

~*~*~

 

The day that the cast on Dean's leg was removed, Missouri decided that Sam needed to learn to control his powers. Dean was skeptical of the idea, but Sam's memory of the way the demon had taunted him while it hurt Dean made Sam determined to try.

Sam agreed to do anything Missouri suggested, and after that he and Missouri spent _hours_ every day doing things that Dean thought were downright silly. They started with juggling fruit and made a huge mess before Sam got the knack of it. The juggling was funny enough for Dean to watch, better than television any day, but then one morning Missouri decided they needed to play Go Fish. Missouri said that it was to help Sam hone his mental skills, but Dean privately thought she suggested it just to see if Sam would do it.

It only took a week or so for Sam to learn to juggle _without_ his hands if he concentrated hard enough, though he couldn't handle more than three objects without giving himself a splitting headache. Reading minds didn't go as well for Sam, though, and after two weeks Missouri still won every card game despite the fact Sam got her to branch out to play poker. Sam had helped Dean fleece hundreds of people at a poker table, but the two of them working together couldn't beat Missouri.

It took weeks for Dean to find out that just because Sam couldn't read Missouri's mind didn't mean that Sam couldn't read anyone. Sam surprised him one night in bed by whispering into Dean's ear _exactly_ what Dean had been thinking. Finding out that Sam could read his mind was a shock, but Sam knew just how to make sure that Dean adjusted very quickly. Sam didn't indulge Dean by doing what Dean had been thinking about, but he did jerk him off slowly, whispering dirty fantasies into Dean's ear the whole time.

Dean teased Sam afterwards about acting innocent and prudish when he could talk dirty enough to make _Dean_ , who had done a hell of a lot, blush like a virgin, but Sam was just smug. When they were touching and Dean was thinking about Sam, as Dean so often was when they touched, Sam could read his mind almost without trying, but Dean was a little bit glad to learn that Sam couldn't just read his mind anytime he wanted to. Sam was already too good at getting Dean to do whatever he wanted without having the advantage of knowing everything Dean thought.

It took Dean three days to connect Sam's new penchant for talking dirty with Sam's ability to read his mind, and hours of picking at Sam for details before Sam finally admitted that he hadn't done much at all. He hadn't ever kissed a guy except for Dean, which Dean definitely liked to hear, and there hadn't been any girls who mattered to Sam besides Jess. Sam had grown to like talking dirty and was beginning to have raunchy ideas of his own by then though, and he soon said something that made Dean finally accept that Sam's sweet face hid a very dirty mind.

After that, there really seemed to be no reason not to move past the dirty talk to actually fulfilling some of the fantasies they whispered to each other in the darkest hours of the night. Dean wasn't fully recovered yet and Sam wouldn't try some things because of his ribs, but Dean didn't even think about complaining.

Sam was always willing when Dean wanted him, and knowing what Dean was thinking made sure that Dean never had to ask him for anything. Dean was very in control of himself in public, or even around Missouri, but with Sam he could let go of his masks and trust Sam to never use it against him. Sam was more generous and creative in bed than anyone Dean had ever been with, and Dean thanked his lucky stars every day that he had taken the chance and kissed his baby brother. It might be 'wrong', but Dean felt more _right_ when he was holding Sam than he ever had before.

Missouri eventually made them move their things down into the basement. It didn't stop her from dreaming about them sometimes, but at least they were far enough away that the noise didn't wake her up anymore.

 

~ End


End file.
